06-0911 Edwards Aquifer Authority, et al. v. Chemical Lime Ltd. from Comal County and the Third District Court of Appeals, Austin For petitioners: Mike Hatchell, Austin For respondent: Robert B. Gilbreath, Dallas The Supreme Court will hear arguments of whether act declared constitutional became effective when opinion was issued or when mandate was. The principal issue is whether the Edwards Aquifer Act became effective when the Court issued its 1996 opinion declaring the act constitutional in Barshop v. Medina County Underground Water Conservation District or when it issued the Barshop mandate. Chemical Lime challenged the authority's denial of Chemical Lime's water permit as an existing user after the authority ruled the application had been submitted too late. Alternatively, Chemical Lime argues, if it missed the deadline to file, it substantially complied with the deadline. In this case the Edwards Aquifer Authority rejected the company's historical water use four years after the company filed it. The company filed its application 18 days after a deadline the authority set after the Court's Barshop decision. The trial court determined the December 30, 1996, deadline was invalid and corrected it to mid-February 1997. The Austin Court of Appeals in this case held that the Edwards Aquifer Act became effective six months after the mandate issued, not six months after the Barshop opinion. The San Antonio Court of Appeals held in a separate case that the deadline properly was set from when the opinion issued.

In this health care-liability case the issue is whether the appeals court properly ordered dismissal because plaintiffs filed the wrong expert report with their petition even though they served the correct report with their pre-suit notice. After the statutory deadline passed, the doctor and other defendants moved to dismiss for failure to file a proper expert report and the plaintiffs then filed the correct report before the trial court ruled on the motion. The trial court denied the dismissal motion, but a divided court of appeals reversed.

In this mandamus action the issue is whether a medical peer-review committee's report recommending no discipline must be disclosed to a physician it investigated. The physician, sued for malpractice, sought the report's disclosure after the hospital, which he named as a responsible third party, contended he was responsible for a surgery error. Franklin, the physician, argues that the Texas Occupations Code, which makes medical peer-review proceedings and records confidential, requires in section 160.007(a) disclosure to a physician the committee is investigating if the committee "takes action that could result in" discipline against the physician. By meeting to review the surgery mistake, the doctor contends, the committee took action and that could have resulted in discipline. The trial court ordered the hospital to produce the report. The court of appeals denied the hospital its requested mandamus relief.